By DAVE HAMRICK
dhamrick@TheCitizenNews.com

A child birth center for Fayette Community Hospital may be a possibility some day, say hospital officials, but not right away.

The need definitely exists, said hospital director Darrell Cutts. “We've delivered 14 babies so far without [an obstetrics/gynecology ward],” Cutts told the Fayette County Commission recently. “In the emergency room, the elevator, the parking lot...”

The hospital's most immediate need for expansion, he said, is for more inpatient rooms. The hospital was licensed for 100 beds when it was created in 1997, but originally held rooms for only 50 beds.

As use of the hospital has increased, Cutts said, those beds have filled up, and the hospital has had to resort to putting some people in semiprivate rooms, increasing the number of beds to 65.

Finishing out the hospital's third floor to provide space for 100 beds in private rooms will cost about $3 million to $4 million, he added.

Piedmont Hospital, parent company to Fayette Community, paid the $48 million cost of building the hospital up front, leaving it debt free. “But they're not interested in having us come to them for three million here and four million there,” said Cutts.

Future needs for specialized equipment and expansion projects will have to be financed, he said.

County commissioners agreed to create a hospital authority to help arrange financing for projects of that type. Through an authority, the private, nonprofit hospital can issue tax-exempt bonds and save money on interest.

If some day the hospital is able to add child birth services, that also would cost about $4 million, Cutts said.

But that requires a certificate of need from the State Health Planning Agency, hospital comptroller John Miles explained. And currently Fayette doesn't meet the state agency's criteria.

The formula, he said, has to do with the population of the area, and its distance from other facilities that offer OB/GYN facilities.

“We're getting closer [to meeting the state criteria], but I don't think we're there quite yet,” said Miles.

If the hospital were allowed to offer child birth facilities, he said, “It would be an immediate success."